Single payer health care is no longer a live option

[undeterred]

for the health care reform bill.

[FreakinDJ]

1. Athou I think the Government Option is the most viable

[xchrom]

2. other -- depends on how angry people get.

what's a shame is that it's such a waste of energy for the people to have to make legislators do the right thing.

[sandnsea]

3. I don't understand the question

When was single payer ever a live option for the health care reform bill? When was single payer ever any kind of realistic option at all??

[undeterred]

5. Before Sen. Schering-Plough did the seating chart the single payer advocates

believed they would be allowed a place at the table.

[sandnsea]

9. That was months ago

So I still don't understand the question. And I didn't understand then why they thought single payer would be considered when Obama said almost every day that he wasn't going to.

[undeterred]

10. People are still organizing rallies for Single Payer Health Care

in the coming weeks. So they must believe its a live option or they are wasting their time.

[sandnsea]

11. They've always been wasting their time

It was never a live option so there is no way that it can "no longer" be a live option.

[annabanana]

29. It is never a waste of time to push the best possible solution to the

forefront. Exposure and coverage is oxygen to good ideas.

[abumbyanyothername]

30. Where can I find one? nt

[undeterred]

32. Here ya go.

http://www.healthcare-now.org/

[abumbyanyothername]

35. Thank you. nt

[RaleighNCDUer]

14. A lot of people hoped that if single-payer spoke strongly enough that

Obama would have to consider it, despite his stance during the campaign. I hoped so myself, though I never expected it.

[sandnsea]

16. So it was never an option

so asking whether it is "no longer" an option is a little ridiculous. He said repeatedly that single payer would be too difficult to implement. The saddest part is that so many polls were misrepresented giving people false hope.

[RaleighNCDUer]

20. Bullshit.

The polls that show 45%+ of the population WANT single payer - that is a large enough minority to be listened to. Add to those numbers those who want a STRONG public option, a Medicare for all, and we are into the 70th percentile.

Where's the 'false hope' that the popularly elected president would be open to popular opinion? It was ALWAYS an option until the single-payer advocates were shut out of the process by Baucus. Obama may guide policy, but he doesn't MAKE policy - that job belongs to congress, and it is congress that is the roadblock. If congress offered single-payer to Obama for signature, he'd sign it.

[sandnsea]

26. People WANT a public option

along side private insurance. That's what every poll I've seen says. Being asked if you support government guaranteeing health care or insurance is not the same thing as replacing insurance. When asked if they want to eliminate private insurance, the answer to that is NO.

You say it yourself, if Congress offered single-payer to Obama, he'd sign it. Congress isn't because they didn't get the support from their constituents. Because the people don't want single payer.

[undeterred]

27. Oh wow, you actually believe Congress listens to voters?

Do you still believe in the tooth fairy and the easter bunny too? Most of our representatives listen to whichever corporations are paying for the next re-election.

[sandnsea]

28. Why is there a public option then? n/t

[John Q. Citizen]

36. Do you know what the CBO is?

The house bill that just passed 3 committees has something that they have given the name "public option" to but it's nothing like the public option that proponents claimed they were in favor of.

The CBO says that the house bill will have a pool that will be operational in 2013 and that by 2019 it MAY have as many as 10 million people enrolled. Many experts think that's very generous. It will provide no cost savings, according to the CBO

Have you read this analysis by Kip Sullivan? He's an nationally known expert on health insurance systems. I had the honor of meeting him and hereing him lecture on the theory of single payer back in 1992 when I was canvassing for Minnesota Citizen Action.

His piece on the history of the Public Option, how it works, why it works, and what the congress passed is very interesting. If you haven't read it i hope you do.

http://www.pnhp.org/blog/2009/07/20/bait-and-switch-how-the-%E2%80%9Cpublic-option%E2%80%9D-was-sold/

[sandnsea]

37. pnhp has started lying

I gave it a click in fairness, but almost right out of the gate, an outrageous lie.

Who ever said this? Kennedy? Dodd? Nobody I ever heard.

"When the “public option” campaign began, its leaders promoted a huge “Medicare-like” program that would enroll about 130 million people. Such a program would dwarf even Medicare, which, with its 45 million enrollees,"

Hacker? When did anybody ever say they were implementing his specific plan?

I had great respect for phnp but they just repeatedly distort the facts in order to push their agenda. They're starting to look like just another agency that's more concerned about its survival than its original mission.

[John Q. Citizen]

39. 130 million is less the half the population. If you added in that plus the amount of people on

Medicare it would be about half the population.

I thought the Dems wanted Universal health care. I heard how The Public Option was going to squeeze out the private insurers and lead to single payer. If a public option can't even get less than half the people in the country how could it ever lead to single payer?

You are kidding me, right? This Universal System you are fighting for is so a drop in the bucket can get off private health insurance?

I can't believe that's what you want. Romney care for the whole country is what you envisioned all along?


Boy, did i miss read you.

Romney care is what Public Option means to you, huh?

Later.

[sandnsea]

40. Nobody said that would happen instantly

And what was said is that the Public Option would keep the insurance companies honest and provide the competition to keep rates low. That's what was said. Nobody ever said it was going to incorporate Medicare. Get me the quotes.

The health care we have in Oregon is fine. OHP, SCHIP and FHIAP. If it was fully funded so everybody was in, and they did away with the outrageous rates for pre-existing conditions, put caps on out of pocket, it would be just as good as single payer. You can call it Romney care if it gives you a thrill. I call it health care.

[John Q. Citizen]

41. How would 10 million enrolled in 10 years keep rates low? That would be

100 million in 100 years. Well less than a third of the population in a public pool. In 100 years.

If it were fully funded? With rates going up at 10 and 20 per cent a year?

ha ha ha ha ha ahhahahhhah hayhha ha :) :* :o ;) :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :toast: O8) O8) :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

I'm sorry i just didn't realize how completely lame the plan you have been hyping all this time really is. It's completely and totally lame

It's a big joke and the joke is on us, the people of this country who aren't so corrupt and stupid that we think it's great, like you do.

That is what you get people are write letters and phone, and give money for? 100 million enrolled in one hundred years?

:+ :+ :toast: O8) O8) :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :roha ha ha ha ha ahhahahhhah hayhha ha :) :* :o ;) :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :+ :toast: O8) O8) :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

2010 is going to be a bloodbath for the Democrats.

[sandnsea]

43. Drinking again I see.

I don't talk to you when you're like this. Sleep it off.

[John Q. Citizen]

44. Nope. Not at all. Just pissed that you question the integrity of my mentor Kip.

He doesn't have to lie about the Public Option. It's his job to know this stuff.

It's your job to tell your people what ever crap the Dem hierarchy passes along to you and then you have to try to defend that stuff you spew by making unfounded attacks on decent people.

I read from many sources like DFA, Move On, HCAN how the Public Option was supposed to be a stepping stone to single payer, and I read and heard it repeatedly. Obama said, "People can choose the public or the private option." It was pure crap.

Obama ran on no mandates. Pure crap.

What the Dems are going to deliver is the worst of all worlds. Mandates to purchase subsidized private insurance with no cost containment. Read what the CBO says. Or is the CBO a liar too? ANd when the money runs out, the benefits will be cut. Just like Oregon, just like MA. Just like WA.

And you have the gall to question someone else's integrity? You should be ashamed of yourself.

[John Q. Citizen]

42. dupe

[BlooInBloo]

4. "not a live option right now" would be better phrasing, imo.

[leftstreet]

6. Insurance/Pharma Bubble > Taxpayer Bailout > Inevitable Single Payer

Didn't you get the memo? That's how this works.

As you can see, we're just heading into phase 1.

Give it a decade or so.

[Sebastian Doyle]

7. I'm still waiting for anyone to give me one good valid reason why we can't do single payer

all I hear is excuses.

[sharesunited]

25. It would abolish for-profit medical insurance. Is that a reason or an excuse?

[Autumn]

8. Other, I don't believe it

ever really was an option.:(

[John Q. Citizen]

12. It's in the housereform bill right now as a states rights option and their is another amendment to

be voted on soon in the house.

It's still alive.

It's the most popular option with the public, though people have resigned themselves to accepting a third or forth rate solution.

[undeterred]

13. Well, my state (Wisconsin) has a great plan

but it won't fly with the budget we've got.

[John Q. Citizen]

34. It requires a law passed so states can take all their medicare, medicade, chip, and

all federal health care dollars and put them in the single payer pool.

then they take all the money they are paying for state county and city health insurance and put it in the pool. Then they negotiate for drugs and global budgets for hospitals, and doctors fees and they do it just like Saskatchewan did it back in the 1960s It costs less than private insurance so the state actually saves money. The state could get back the refund premiums from the insurance companies and put them in the pool, and then it's funded also covered with an income tax.

[Maru Kitteh]

15. I thought, for reality based individuals at least, this was obvious.

There is no evidence that has any chance of passing right now. That's damn unfortunate, and I intend to keep pushing for SP, but to pitch a fit and declare "Single payer or nothing!" would be murderously irresponsible and selfish.

[damntexdem]

17. It should have been but it never was.

It's much more popular with the population than with the politicians.

[AndyA]

18. When politicians get involved in something, it's always either

f*cked up completely, corrupted, a half-assed solution, or laden down with so much crap it costs ten times what it would have before the politicians got involved.

We need term limits. Out with the old, in with the new.

[defendandprotect]

19. Other: EVERY OTHER PEOPLE have succeeded in getting single payer health care . . .

However, I don't think we're going to get it simply using e-mail and telephone calls --

it means getting out into the streets -- talking to other citizens -- pushing legislators hard.

[frebrd]

21. It never was a live option.....

not for an instant.

[lumberjack_jeff]

22. The value of the single payer discussion...

... is to keep the pressure on to implement a strong public option.

[undeterred]

31. Thank you.

[Political Tiger]

23. Other: Never was. n/t

[WI_DEM]

24. It never has been not now and not in '93 with Clinton's plan.

[L0oniX]

33. Why is over 40 million with no health care considered to be a minority?

So lets take away the over 65 crowd and remove the young who are not working and what do we have left? My guess is about 100 to 150 million working people. So are those with out health care working? If so then about 1/3 are not getting any health care. I'd say that most average working people can't afford health insurance @ 300 per person with 5k yearly deductible. I guess what I am trying to say is that over 40 million people without health care is a lot more percentage wise than what it's made out to be. If it's a minority then it's not far from being half of all working people. Oh yea ...and those who were let go from their jobs ...how many of that over 40 million figure are they taking up? Last I heard we have had over 4 million people fired or let go this year. My bet is that they don't have health care other than asprin and the like ...not to mention the rest of their family. Bet me that those without health care number over half the working and those who have lost their jobs don't make up over half of those who would benefit from a single payer health care system. Who can afford gov health insurance when your unemployed or only make 20k a year? I believe we are being fed 99% sociopath bull shit from all sides.

Kucinich 2012

[bobbolink]

38. There was a time years ago to educate the population about it.

That ship sailed.